Toilet gibes spur Warriors to rethink Mission Bay arena design

Original design of Golden State Warriors planned Mission Bay arena had critics saying it resembled a toilet.

Original design of Golden State Warriors planned Mission Bay arena had critics saying it resembled a toilet.

Photo: M&r / Manica Architecture

Photo: M&r / Manica Architecture

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Original design of Golden State Warriors planned Mission Bay arena had critics saying it resembled a toilet.

Original design of Golden State Warriors planned Mission Bay arena had critics saying it resembled a toilet.

Photo: M&r / Manica Architecture

Toilet gibes spur Warriors to rethink Mission Bay arena design

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The Golden State Warriors have given their planned Mission Bay arena a design do-over intended to make everyone forget about an earlier set of drawings in which the 18,000-seat venue looked very much like a toilet.

Gone is much of the rectangular viewing deck that, when coupled with the oval arena, gave the overhead view of the place the appearance of a giant toilet seat with the lid down. The deck has been shaved down to about half its old size, dropped about 13 feet below the roof line and given a sweeping curve.

“We are trying to flush the toilet bowl forever out of people’s consciousness,” said Warriors arena consultant Jesse Blout.

Instead, it looks more like an old Discman CD player, less likely to be the butt of humor.

The jokes over the old initial design, unveiled in September, went viral. On Sports Illustrated’s website, one fan said it looked like “half George ForemanGrill, half airplane toilet.”

The team’s designers with the firms Manica Architecture and Snøhetta quickly went back to the drawing board, coming up with new sketches they plan to present Thursday to the Mission Bay Citizens Advisory Committee. The neighborhood group has been asked by the city to help steer the planning process for the $1 billion arena, retail and office development.

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The new design also calls for a pair of 160-foot-tall office buildings, a central plaza larger than Union Square, and lots of ground-floor restaurants and other retail.

P.J. Johnston, a spokesman for the Warriors, said the team hopes to break ground by next fall and open the arena in time for the 2018-19 season. He said the Warriors would honor the local hiring and labor deals they agreed to when the team was still contemplating building its arena on Piers 30-32.

Some boosters of the neighboring new UCSF Medical Center are grumbling about the effect the arena will have on parking and traffic in Mission Bay. But don’t count on the hospital pushing back too hard.

The Warriors have a deal to buy the 12-acre arena site from Salesforce, whose CEO, Marc Benioff, is one of UCSF’s biggest benefactors. Just days before the Warriors announced they were moving to the new site, Benioff gave UCSF another $50 million for its Children’s Hospital in Oakland.

On board: No sooner was he sworn in Monday than newly elected BART board member Nick Josefowitz circulated an ad for a legislative director to help him with his official duties — something no other director has.

And here’s a twist: Josefowitz is offering to pay for the aide himself.

“It’s going to be odd — nobody in my experience at BART has done that before,” said BART board President Joel Keller.

He’s seeking someone with a “graduate degree in public policy, law, business or related field.”

No salary has been set, but Josefowitz told us Tuesday that he expects to pay a bit less than the $82,000-a-year starting salary that aides to San Francisco supervisors earn.

Josefowitz, who made a fortune in the clean-energy business, spent nearly $200,000 of his own money to win election to a job that pays about $18,000 annually. He ousted 24-year incumbent James Fang.

“I’m putting my money where my mouth is,” Josefowitz said, by hiring someone who can help deliver on his campaign promises for cleaner BART stations and other rider-friendly changes.

Josefowitz says he spoke to a number of fellow BART directors about his hire, “and they didn’t seem to have a problem with it.”

And finally: Our column Monday about those roving bands of female thieves in colorful clothing — known to police and their victims in fashionable Union Square stores as the “Rainbow Girls” — didn’t sit well with the South Bay’s Virginia Dunn.

“As an adult leader to a local assembly of the International Order of the Rainbow for Girls in San Jose, I am appalled,” Dunn told us in an e-mail. “To use our name ... for thieves is unconscionable. Our girls, Rainbow Girls, do community service” — including raising money for the Shriners’ learning development centers.

San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross appear Sundays, Mondays and Wednesdays. Matier can be seen on the KPIX TV morning and evening news. He can also be heard on KCBS radio Monday through Friday at 7:50 a.m. and 5:50 p.m. Got a tip? Call (415) 777-8815, or e-mail matierandross@sfchronicle.com. Twitter: @matierandross